note by meanmistermustard: For anyone who is interested additional discussion of the Beatles and the religion(s) they followed can be found here (however please note that that topic is locked so as not to have duplicate ongoing conversations).

I was just wondering, what religions did the boys follow? I know George was hindu in the late 60's, but does anyone know what he was before that? What about the other 3?

"The best band? The Beatles. The most overrated band? The Beatles."

7 June 20106.41pm

GniknuS

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I think before they all followed the religion of Elvis Presley.

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7 June 20107.36pm

Sunii

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John-Anglican/Episcopalian

Paul-Roman Catholic

Ringo-I'm really not sure. Some people say he is Jewish. All I know is I think he believes in God
.

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7 June 20109.21pm

MadiYasha

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Sunii said:

Ringo-I'm really not sure. Some people say he is Jewish. All I know is I think he believes in God
.

He's major Christian nowadays. I read an article about it just a while ago.

I always thought John was, too--he just had issues with organized religion.

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7 June 20109.46pm

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I think, except for George, the other three aren't/weren't very religious people.

I'd like to say "thank you" on behalf of the group and ourselves and I hope we passed the audition.
John Lennon

7 June 201010.20pm

Sun Queen

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After he gives a speech at an awards show or what not, Paul usually says "God
bless." I don't know if that's just something you say nowadays, but it may point in a theological direction.

In my Beatleology book that I purchased a while ago, (this one:)

there's a whole section about Religion. The John answers all seem to be from an atheist/nihilist/non-organized religion supporter standpoint, Ringo answers are neither-here-nor-there, George's stray to a merely spiritual outlook- not so much religion- and Paul answers are both spiritual and religious and believe in God
.

Maybe that will help?

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8 June 20102.39am

Lexxi

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Did John REALLY SAY THIS???

Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock and roll or Christianity.
-John Lennon

I'm a Christian,and I am a fan of The Bealtes, but to actually think he REALLY DID SAY THIS............I feel angry,

and I'm very surprised he wasn't scared as hell to say such a thing.

"I used to think anyone doing anything weird was weird. Now I know that it is the people that call others weird that are weird."

~Paul McCartney

8 June 20104.31am

McLerristarr

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Yes, John said that. And it was kind of true. It was taken out of context though. Read all the info about it on this site, it's really interesting.

Just for the record, before the whole 60s spiritual Revolution
thing, they were all atheist/agnostic. Paul said it in an interview. The interview is on this site somewhere. In the mid-60s, George's fascination with India made him turn Hindu, and Paul and Ringo became more spiritual than actually religious. Recently Ringo said he's found God
(not sure how you could lose him though if he's everywhere). John said he was "one of Christ's biggest fans", but I think that was more because Jesus was a "peace activist" rather than because he is believed by some/many to be the son of God
. John hated organised religion, so because of that, I don't think he ever stopped being atheist/agnostic.

8 June 20105.42am

skye

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Lexxi said:

Did John REALLY SAY THIS???

Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock and roll or Christianity.

I'm a Christian,and I am a fan of The Bealtes, but to actually think he REALLY DID SAY THIS............I feel angry,

and I'm very surprised he wasn't scared as hell to say such a thing.

Yes, he did. I would say that's what he thought at the time, but with his drug use, I'm not 100% sure. And what he thought later? I can't really say, I haven't looked that far into the topic. In any case, Christianity is still here.

Ad hoc, ad loc, and quid pro quo! So little time! So much to know!

8 June 20106.51am

The CREeK

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Yes, he did say it. It pissed a lot of people off! Yet they are still the greatest and most popular band ever! Being an athiest in the middle of reading the bible, I can see why John said this. They had fans worldwide. Most of the population beleives in some form of Christianity but not everyone! Therefore, it is plausible that The Beatles were, in fact, more popular than Jesus at the time John made that statement.

Yeah, Ringo is a Christian these days. Here's an unrelated quote from Anthology, in the 1964 chapter:

RINGO: [On the first American tour] Some people decided to make an example of me, as an English Jew. (The one major fault is I'm not Jewish.) Threats we took in our stride. I mean, suddenly there would be a few more cops; but this was one of the few times I was really worried. We were playing the gig and, as always, I was on a high-riser. I had the cymbals up towards the audience to give me a bit of protection; usually I had them flat on. I also had a plain-clothes policeman sitting there with me. But I started to get hysterical, because I thought, 'If someone in the audience has a pop at me, what is this guy going to do? Is he going to catch the bullet?' I found this was getting funnier and funnier all the time, and the guy just sat there.

In Many Years From Now, Paul speaks several times about how he doesn't have any time for religion. I'll look up the quotes if I get time.

Paul was born on 18 June 1942, five months after the bombing ceased, in Walton Hospital. His mother, Mary, had been the nursing sister in charge of the maternity ward before leaving to have children and was welcomed back with a bed in a private ward. He was named James Paul McCartney
after his father, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather and was later to name his own son James. Eighteen months later, Paul's brother Michael was born on 7 January 1944. The boys were both baptised Catholics, their mother's faith, but religion did not play a part in their upbringing. Their father had been christened in the Church of England but later became agnostic. Paul and Michael were not sent to Catholic schools because Jim thought they concentrated too much upon religion and not enough on education.

PAUL: Mother
Mary [in Let It Be
] makes it a quasi-religious thing, so you can take it that way. I don't mind. I'm quite happy if people want to use it to shore up their faith. I have no problem with that. I think it's a great thing to have faith of any sort, particularly in the world we live in. My mother was Catholic and she had me and my brother christened but that was the only religious thing we went through other than school, and occasional visits to church, where I sang in a surpliced choir. The first time I ever heard about religion really was when I was in hospital when I was eleven, and the sister on the ward lilted up my case sheet and said 'What religion are you? It's not on here.' I said, 'I don't know.' She said, 'C of E?' I said, 'Probably.'

George, 1967: Ravi's my musical guru… But then later I realised that this wasn't the real thing, this was only a little stepping stone for me to see, because through the music, you reach the spiritual part… My stepping stones have led me to become a Hindu… It's a good vibration which makes you feel good. Those vibrations that you get through yoga, cosmic chants, it's such a buzz. It buzzes you out of everywhere. It's nothing to do with pills or anything like that. It's just in your own head. It buzzes you right into the astral plane.

As yet, George had taken no personal guru, though he was very influenced by the work of Vivekananda. The other Beatles were intrigued and showed great sympathy and respect for his interest and commitment to Hinduism, but Indian philosophy remained primarily George's interest. Paul told NME in August 1967: 'In some ways I envy George because he now has a great faith. He seems to have found what he's been searching for.'

Paul, 1967: 'God
is everything. God
is in the space between us. God
is in the table in front of you. God
is everything and everywhere and everyone. It just happens that I've realised all this through acid.'

PAUL: I had a litter of cats called Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Jesus ran off, Joseph stuck around for a long time, and Mary had kittens. We put the kittens in this little box and I remember me and Brian Jones stayed up all night, looking at the kittens. I got the word 'God
' from three symbols on the side of the box: one of them was a moon, the G was the sun, and the star was like the D. And somehow it read, 'God
'. I had this live-in couple called the Kellys who would wake you up early in the morning like everything was just going normally and we had just stayed up all night and it was like, 'Go away please!' It was just amazing because we were actually watching what went on. Instead of saying, 'Oh yes, we've got kittens, ain't they marvellous? There they are, cuddly cuddly, now I'm going to go and do something important,' we took five hours with these kittens. Now they call it 'Stop and smell the flowers'. They say you should do more things like that in a stressful life.

The funny thing about that was the night when we were going to record [Fixing A Hole
], at Regent Sound Studios at Tottenham Court Road. I brought a guy who was Jesus. A guy arrived at my front gate and I said 'Yes? Hello' because I always used to answer it to everyone. If they were boring I would say, 'Sorry, no,' and they generally went away. This guy said, 'I'm Jesus Christ.' I said, 'Oop,' slightly shocked. I said, 'Well, you'd better come in then.' I thought, Well, it probably isn't. But if he is, I'm not going to be the one to turn him away. So I gave him a cup of tea and we just chatted and I asked, 'Why do you think you are Jesus?' There were a lot of casualties about then. We used to get a lot of people who were maybe insecure or going through emotional break­downs or whatever. So I said, 'I've got to go to a session but if you promise to be very quiet and just sit in a corner, you can come.' So he did, he came to the session and he did sit very quietly and I never saw him after that. I introduced him to the guys. They said, 'Who's this?' I said, 'He's Jesus Christ.' We had a bit of a giggle over that.

Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first – rock and roll or Christianity.
-John Lennon

I'm a Christian,and I am a fan of The Bealtes, but to actually think he REALLY DID SAY THIS…………I feel angry,

and I'm very surprised he wasn't scared as hell to say such a thing.

Ahhhh, hello Lexxi! You finally joined after all of my convincing!
I, too, am a Christian, but not so bothered by it. And I'm not surprised he said it either. That is just how John is…

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8 June 20104.05pm

mithveaen

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Sunii said:

I, too, am a Christian, but not so bothered by it. And I'm not surprised he said it either. That is just how John is…

Maybe this conversation happened.

John arriving to Heaven being welcomed by a very tall Jesus.

Jesus (looking down) : "So, you were the one who said you and your mates were bigger than I?"

John (looking up) "I said bigger, not taller"

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8 June 20104.08pm

Sunii

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mithveaen said:

Maybe this conversation happened.

John arriving to Heaven being welcomed by a very tall Jesus.

Jesus (looking down) : "So, you were the one who said you and your mates were bigger than I?"

John (looking up) "I said bigger, not taller"

LOL!

Maybe it did happen.....but wherever he went, I am quite sure he is enjoying himself.

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8 June 20108.28pm

Sun Queen

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mithveaen said:

Sunii said:

I, too, am a Christian, but not so bothered by it. And I'm not surprised he said it either. That is just how John is…

Maybe this conversation happened.

John arriving to Heaven being welcomed by a very tall Jesus.

Jesus (looking down) : "So, you were the one who said you and your mates were bigger than I?"

John (looking up) "I said bigger, not taller"

Hah! Very funny. I'm not a Christian or very religious at all (I was raised Catholic though, just like ol' Paulie) and religion didn't play an enormous part in my life, as much as my parents tried to force it on us. I can see how it could be considered offensive, but, I find it rings quite true.

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8 June 20109.10pm

Sunii

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Alissa said:

I can see how it could be considered offensive, but, I find it rings quite true.

True?!

I would make an ugly mean comment back, but I'm not like that. All I will say is that I think it isn't true.

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8 June 201010.53pm

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Sunii said:

Alissa said:

I can see how it could be considered offensive, but, I find it rings quite true.

True?!

I would make an ugly mean comment back, but I'm not like that. All I will say is that I think it isn't true.

I mean at the time (and, perhaps even now) the Beatles seem to be more widespread than Christianity is. The Beatles are known all over the world, despite what country or race across the globe. Christianity, though, is a known concept and religion as well as the belief in Jesus, but that belief isn't as accepted/known as a Beatle's song is. Though, I'm not sure the two can be compared in the first place.

Jeez- did I just pull a John? Hope I'm not putting my foot in my mouth- this may be too controversial.

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9 June 201012.00am

Sunii

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Alissa said:

I mean at the time (and, perhaps even now) the Beatles seem to be more widespread than Christianity is. The Beatles are known all over the world, despite what country or race across the globe. Christianity, though, is a known concept and religion as well as the belief in Jesus, but that belief isn't as accepted/known as a Beatle's song is. Though, I'm not sure the two can be compared in the first place.
Jeez- did I just pull a John? Hope I'm not putting my foot in my mouth- this may be too controversial.

Yep, it looks like you just did pull a John.

Anyways, I really don't agree with anything you just said, but everyone has their opinions. I guess I am just a really religious person.

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9 June 201012.52am

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Religion. Touchy subject.

John struggled with organized religion for many years while still believing the central myths, right up until he began primal scream therapy (post-Beatles). That experience let him finally let go of the whole thing and not look back.

Once he reached that point, John seems not to have struggled with religion at all.

What does it matter? John and Yoko tithed their vast income, which is something the religious are supposed to do, but rarely do. So if John was by far more charitable than probably any Christian out there, and worked harder for peace than almost anyone on the planet, why is it important that he should believe in this or that?

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